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Monthly Archives: April 2017

As I look out into the world, I see so much to be grateful for. Surrounded by beauty, I am left in no doubt that we live in a spirit filled world that is becoming more authentic in the beauty that it is able to appreciate. For so long we have come to define beauty on a superficial level, but as we grow, so will our ability to appreciate beauty grow within us.

With this, understand that only can we recognize and appreciate what is truly beautiful when we have unified with the essence of our own beauty within ourselves. So many struggle to find the beauty in the world when they look outside. Fearful of what they will encounter, they see a world filled with anger, hostility and ugliness, and because this is what they see, this is what becomes real for them, and they continue to live as their self fulfilling prophecy would have it be.

Neglecting their own beauty, they have swallowed a nightmare pill which alters dramatically the world in which they see. Turning away from the spirit, they have chosen to embrace the ego, which sees things always in a distorted light. With power and strength to gain for itself, the ego is devoted not to searching for beauty, but to finding that which can build it up in the eyes of the world. Concerned with the physical world and pleasing those within it, it is not at all interested in the wisdom of the spirit.

Not wanting to be the protagonist in its own demise, the ego has a vested interest in keeping the true source of beauty from your eyes. Not wanting you to experience the awe that beauty inspires, it seeks to keep you in a state of boredom where you ask no questions of life. Asking no questions, you cease to interact with life, and you deprive yourself of the answers that God wants to give to you. This is what it means to be reactive to life, and to suffer in the process.

Called to be proactive, we do not grow in our experience of life, if we have closed ourselves off to what it seeks to teach us. Wanting to show us the beauty in the world and in ourselves, it is a willing teacher, but a teacher has no role to occupy without a student in attendance. This is why we must be open-minded in beauty’s presence. With much to give, there is much to learn about the beauty of God which manifests itself in all things.

It is said that beauty is in the eye of the beholder. What this means to me is that each of us has the capacity to find beauty in different things. What some label beautiful, others might label ugly, and vice versa. But does it really matter what verdict is passed on whether something is pleasing to the eye or not? What matters absolutely is the seed of beauty to be found in all things that God has created. With the beauty of the creator pervading each of his creations, that beauty is definitely there to see. The question then becomes what is the quality of the vision of the observer?

Many are capable of seeing the beauty in all that surrounds them, but even more are not. Selective in what they ascribe the label ‘beautiful’ to, these people have chosen to honour the mind above the heart, which is all to discriminating. Seeing more than the mind is capable of seeing, the heart knows that it is futile to judge, because it realizes that judgment passed on that which appears in a diminished light is falsely condemned. Seeing only a portion of the whole, much is misunderstood; and embracing only a part, much is rejected as irrelevant. See in this, the dangerous game that we play when we choose to have the ego’s eyes be the filter with which we view the world.

Seeing only fragments of beauty that it has contaminated through its own judgment, much is discarded, and even less honoured, for God cannot be seen by that which despises his presence. Wanting you not to see him, the ego will lead you to label as ugly, much that is beautiful in appearance and substance.

Intense in its loathing, the ego is not always rational in its judgment, and even in its certainty, it misses much to be appreciated. See in this how the ego’s arrogance often leads it to abandon that which could otherwise serve it. Cursed in its blindness, it makes not for wise counsel to the one who searches for a deeper experience of life.

Wanting to experience love, one must consult the heart, being the centre of beauty inside the self. Being not separate from God, it is the gift that God has given us to enjoy the world. Blessed with much, we can find much joy when we look upon the world with spiritual eyes. Hindered not by that which are the ego’s shortcomings, we can see the love behind the barriers, and the distinctions which make the miraculous commonplace.

Blessed in spirit, we must not take for granted that which is capable of teaching us who we truly are. Endowed with wisdom, all of God’s creations are capable teachers, and assuming not a separate identity from him, they are models to be emulated. With this, learn that beauty is distorted as the separation is affected. So as you travel far from him, so will your ability to experience beauty diminish in strength.

Concerned primarily with attaching labels in the moment, what eludes you is the beauty inherent in entering the moment. To enter the moment, is to join with God in your heart, and see what he sees in the physical world. With all that he created being good, you are then able to see the love that pervades everything in the light of the spirit. Appreciating everything just as it is, you understand that it is enough and that the ego does not have to be invited to enhance what is complete in itself.

Complete, the gifts of God are holy in what they hold and what they deliver. Endowed with beauty, they bring to the lost man, much that is invaluable. Longing for God, those who are lost, suffer in their desperation. Convinced of their own ugliness, the memories of their eternal beauty slip into the past. But the past is not lost forever, for every illusion stands to be corrected, and as a partner with eternity, it will not fail to reveal itself in a touch that the moment has in store, for the child who sees clearly now, not yearning for more.

One of the most memorable times that I recall beauty touching me deeply was in Florence when I went to see Michelangelo’s David. I had heard from many people how wonderful this classical piece of sculpture was, but hearing a second hand account doesn’t really prepare you for the effect that it has on the soul, when you see it in person. To say that I was taken aback by its beauty would be an understatement. I was left absolutely speechless! To think that one man saw this masterpiece in that block of marble and saw it as his purpose to bring it to life for all to enjoy is awe inspiring to me.

But as I was standing there, just gazing up at the masterwork, I knew not the distraction of thought that attempted to persuade my mind to intellectualize how the work was brought to life. This allowed me to centre myself and let the profound beauty that emanated from the shiny white surface, move my spirit powerfully in the moment. And as I just allowed the moment to touch me, I felt for a moment just how Michelangelo must have felt with the chisel in his hand and the spirit in his heart, for as I am not alone with my pen, he was not alone with his tools, for with every incision had God’s hand revealed itself so gently and lovingly.

All in all, I spent about an hour in the company of David, listening only to the silence which was my teacher. And as I meditated on what had greeted my senses, I felt a deep sense of appreciation begin to emerge, and as my eyes began to well up with tears, my constant companion placated my fears that I would miss something, a moment, which taught me who I am, not alone in war, but beautiful and fair.

To know Michelangelo must have been to be in the company of a great lover. Here was a man who made it his life’s purpose to serve the world by making manifest in physical form, the love that he carried inside. How else can you explain it? To look into the eyes of David is to know without a shadow of a doubt that he was conceived in love, and because it was this love that filled Michelangelo’s heart, the conception was inevitable.

With this, understand that love never leaves beauty unexpressed, for that is not love’s way. And in the same way that love will never leave beauty unexpressed, so will it never leave the witnesses to that beauty untouched, for the heart that was inspired to bring the beauty to life, is in no way separate from the heart of the witness who has seen in that beauty a clear image of themself revealed.

See in this, how all embodiments of beauty carry a reflection that is not one dimensional. If you were to observe a rose, you would be moved by the beauty of that rose, but what has moved you is not limited to the petals, stem and thorns which make up that rose. What you receive from that rose is an experience of the beauty of nature which is in no way separate from all that the rose is, because nature is the essence of its being. And as it is with the rose, so it is with you, because nature is the very essence of who you are. As God has breathed life into the rose, so has God breathed life into you, and in it you get a glimpse of not only its glory, but your glory as well, which is a stranger not to the glory of God.

Endowed with all that is beautiful, do not doubt what is yours to give, and as you awake from your slumber, so will your brothers and sisters enjoy a more peaceful rest. Not tormented by their hideous nightmares, a new joy will emerge in the form of a dream that is not isolated in how it comes to bless them. As beauty multiplies, so does its visions, in the mind that has unified itself with the heart.

Filled with this love, joy replaces sorrow and gratitude replaces judgment, for as the Lord has spoken, you need not open your mouth to speak. Speaking in glorious tongues, you are left in no doubt that what he has to say is real. Beautiful in its composition, it is undeniably powerful in its resonance. Teaching your heart, the mind finds rest, subsumed by the grace that has cradled it, and when it awakes, immense beauty awaits it, in both its relationship to the physical and the infinite which know no divide. Being what beauty has conquered, love has done its work, through the eye of the spirit that cannot be blinded to the world’s worth.

To some people, changing the oil in your car is just like changing the oil in your motorcycle. Just drain out the old oil, install a new oil filter, and pour in the desired amount of new oil and your done. So when it comes time to change your motorcycle oil, why can’t you use the same oil that you use in your car? Motorcycle oil and automotive oil look and feel the same so how could there be a difference between the two?

Automotive oil looks pretty enticing at $3 a quart but any experienced motorcycle rider knows that using automotive oil in motorcycles causes serious damage. In automotive vehicles, the engine is always separate from the clutch and transmission so they have separate oils for each. In automotive engine oil, there is more of what is called “friction modifiers” to help lessen the amount of friction on engine components and improve fuel economy. Of course, improving fuel economy has always been the main goal of the automotive industry making friction modifiers a necessity for all automotive oils.

These friction modifiers that are added to automotive oils are what cause serious damages when used in motorcycles. The friction modifiers clog the clutch plates in a motorcycle’s transmission causing serious clutch slippage and disabling the motorcycle. You see, for motorcycles to be as compact as they are, they have to combine their engine and transmission into one casing. This means that everything is lubricated by only one type of oil including the valves, piston, transmission , and clutch.

Motorcycles require very little and/or no friction modifiers to help improve clutch friction and to prevent clutch slippage. But to make up for this lack of friction modifiers, motorcycle oils use higher levels of anti-wear additives such as ZDDP, also known as phosphorous, to limit engine friction and wear. Since motorcycle oil has extra anti-wear additives and is lubricating so much more than automotive oil, you can expect to pay anywhere from $9 to $15 a quart.

To some people, both oils look and feel the same but now you know the facts of each. So the next time that you decide to change your motorcycle oil, go straight to your local motorcycle dealer and buy only high quality motorcycle oil designed specifically for the type of motorcycle you own. Make sure that you change your oil periodically to keep it fresh and clean to ensure a long life for your engine, transmission , and clutch.

Over the past few years some dangerous Staph bacteria have become resistant to antibiotics. Only recently has the news media focused on this serious new health problem, which is of urgent concern to our schools. These killer bacteria, called methicillin resistant Staphylococcus aureus or “MRSA”, have recently caused panic in schools in the USA. Some infected students have become seriously ill and some have died after these antibiotic resistant bacteria invaded their blood stream. Most Staph bacteria only causes minor skin infections and are treated with antibiotics. Serious and deadly infections however, develop when antibiotic resistant bacteria (MRSA) is involved. The best methods for prevention of all types of Staph infections involve general cleaning strategies which can be incorporated into the routine cleaning practices at all schools. Here are some tips for limiting the possibility of Staph bacteria infecting your students:

1.) Establish a daily and routine environmental cleaning schedule for your school restrooms and dining areas. The cleaning staff should be trained and monitored to be sure they understand and practice thorough and effective cleaning procedures. Your local health department can provide advice on procedures.

2.) Use germicidal products or a solution of 1 part chlorine bleach and 9 part water to clean any surface that is subject to frequent touching by students, including light switches, doorknobs, faucet handles, hand rails and all restroom fixtures. Use soap and water at a minimum, preferably an all-purpose cleaner, for a daily cleaning of all other floors and surfaces.

3.) Install automatic soap dispensers, automatic hand dryers and automatic paper towel dispensers. These touch-free automatic dispensers will reduce student’s exposure to appliances that are frequently the source of hand transmitted bacteria. like Staph. If your school still utilizes the old manual hands-on dispensers it will be nearly impossible to clean them frequently enough to eliminate the spread of bacteria.

4.) Immediately clean up any surface that has a visible body fluid contamination such as blood, urine or other body fluid.

5.) Make sure automatic soap dispensers and automatic paper towel dispensers are filled with product at all times. This should be part of the cleaning personnel daily routine. Refill the dispensers daily.

6.) Encourage good hygiene. Students should be cautioned against sharing water bottles and personal items, encourages to shower after gym classes and other physical activities.

7.) Require that students cover cuts, abrasions and lesions with a proper dressing (bandage) until healed. Athletics staff should monitor this closely among their athletes.

8.) Clean all items used in athletic activities with an all-purpose cleaner and wash uniforms after each use.

9.) Publish, articulate and post reminders to staff and employees the importance of frequent hand washing with soap and water or the use of germicidal hand gels. Your schools restrooms and cafeteria should have warning signs posted in highly visible areas reminding everyone that hand washing is a requirement of your facility and is everyone’s responsibility.

Following these simple cleaning routines will greatly reduce you schools risk of bacterial infections of all types, including Staph and viruses, such as the flu, and the common cold.

Wide-area networking and the Internet are becoming more and more reliable, to support strategic objectives. This has restructured the way businesses work, and even in some cases stay afloat. Today companies are faced with more applications, more users, and more desktop power, but with less visibility, control, and predictability. With unprecedented network demands and without the ability to control how they effect your business. PacketShaper can assist you in controlling and enhancing the performance of your WAN. PacketShaper continues providing visibility and control across your WAN, to enhance the application monitoring and performance for any user, in any location, throughout networks of enterprises spread around. Depending on the speed of the network links it will manage, this device comes in a wide range of levels to suit. The lowest entry level box is for a 128k line with the high-end box being able to monitor and manage a 1 Gigabit link.

The PacketShaper traffic shaping technology enables the administrator to resolve WAN and Internet performance problems that effect networks. By actively preventing network congestion, shaping controls application performance and bandwidth consumption. Administrators can achieve more important tasks in lesser time, with fewer performance-related complaints and a higher Quality of Service (QoS) for all networked users. With PacketShaper, the never-ending cycle of bandwidth upgrades is a thing of the past. PacketShaper optimizes application throughput throughout your current network infrastructure.

PacketShaper is simple to configure and comes with basic step-by-step instructions comprising such things as passwords, IP addresses and connection speeds etc. Initial physical installation is extremely easy, and once the PacketShaper is on the network it can accessed through a web browser and can be configured on of two ways: by a normal http connection or a secure http connection.

Internal attacks from worm infections, unauthorized recreational traffic and rogue servers can severely impact network capacity and bring down critical applications but PacketShaper assists in recognising when PCs are infected or unauthorized traffic is passing through the network, and also protects the performance of crucial applications. PacketShaper alsoprotects the performance of the network during attack-all while providing hard ROI from bandwidth savings, enhanced WAN capabilities and accelerated application performance. An additional effective function of the PacketShaper is its graphing abilities. It is simple to locate older data from the ‘straight out of the box’ system. Clear and simplified graphs are presented in the form of either line graphs or pie charts, though it is possible for this data to be shown as raw data if required, which makes it easy to export it to other programs. Installation of IP Telephony (IPT) and Voice/Video over IP (VoIP) vary from company to company and its employees, effecting every network in a different way. A successful implementation depends on guaranteed bandwidth and QoS, and also fitting more calls onto a restricted WAN resource.

PacketShaper efficiently controls vital IPT protocols, providing WAN capacity and true QoS functionality to guarantee the highest quality end-to-end communication for each call. It makes sense to unite servers from remote sites to centralized data centers, although the additional traffic loads call for precise classification, monitoring and shaping before any advantages can be appreciated. PacketShaper detects and controls common traffic-including CIFS, VoIP, CRM, Web and P2P-while also tracking Microsoft’s underlying CIFS changes in R2. MPLS and IP VPNs are beneficial for relating distributed locations, but advantages cannot be noticed if applications are oversubscribed, traffic stalls in bottlenecks and critical applications are inappropriately designated to best-effort classes. PacketShaper carries on the MPLS promise, weighing up performance, detecting and marking application traffic with special handling requirements so traffic can move freely to the enterprise edge. This system is integrated in a single appliance with multiple software choices that deliver:

Control over application performance and network utilization.

Visibility into application performance and network utilization.

Compression to accelerate performance and increase WAN capacity.

Centralized management of performance analysis, reporting, and policy administration for large Packeteer deployments.

The Packeteer PacketShaper is an architected bandwidth management device that is incredibly useful and at the same time simple . It delivers an easy and user friendly interface that can be advantageous to any organisation from low-end, to expert users. With minimal configuration, PacketShaper will become a crucial tool in keeping the network secure and also managing bandwidth.

Car buyers are always in the lookout for the car offering the best value for their money. Different firms have been guiding prospective car buyers on how to choose the vehicle the suits their needs best. From performance to fuel economy to safety, all bases should be covered in choosing a vehicle.

IntelliChoice, one of the leading sources of pertinent information to car buyers, recently announced their “Best Deals” list. The list contains what the online outfit thinks is the best vehicle in different classes. For the month of April, IntelliChoice announced their “Best Deals” and this has been done coinciding with the ongoing New York International Auto Show (NYIAS) in the Big Apple.

This month’s list includes several models from Japan’s three biggest car manufacturers. These vehicles are seen as the measuring stick for future production vehicles unveiled and showcased at the New York Auto Show. James Bell, the publisher of IntelliChoice.com, has this to say with regards to the list and the vehicles showcased at the event: “Even more than recent auto shows, the New York show offered a look at some very compelling future competition to many of the mainstays on our monthly ‘Best Deals’ list.”

The Honda Civic hybrid is rated as the best deal for the Compact Car over $16,000 class by IntelliChoice.com. For the Compact Car under $16,000 class, the best deal is touted to be the Honda Civic DX with an automatic transmission.

Aside from these two models, another Honda produced vehicle was named as a best deal in its class – the Honda Civic Si. The said model is named as the best deal in the Base Sport Car class. The Honda Odyssey is once again named as the best deal for the Minivan class. The Honda Odyssey has been dominating that class in recent history but will face strong competition in the form of the Ford Flex recently unveiled at the New York International Auto Show.

A Nissan model is also named as one of the best deals for the month of April. The Nissan Frontier King Cab XE 2WD with a manual transmission is named as the best deal for the Compact Pickup Truck 2WD class. The King Cab is the first crew cab body style compact pickup truck in North America and since its inception in the U.S. auto market has been popular among car buyers. With its trademark dependability, the Nissan Frontier is not a surprise choice as the best deal for its class. Its high performance construction and components such as the Nissan spark plug wires are one of the reasons why the Frontier sits at the top of its class.

Toyota, the surging Japanese car manufacturer, also landed several of its models at the “Best Deals” list. The popular Toyota Prius is named as the best deal for the Midsize Car under $21,000 while the Prius Touring is named as the best deal for the Midsize Car over $21,000 class.

For the Large Car class, IntelliChoice picked the Toyota Avalon Touring as the best deal for consumers. The Toyota Highlander Hybrid with a third row seating and 2WD configuration is named as the best deal for the Midsize Crossover class. The Toyota Matrix Standard with manual transmission is also named as the best deal for the Small Wagon class.

For the Compact Pickup Truck 4WD class, IntelliChoice picked the Toyota Tacoma Regular Cab 4WD as the best deal. The Toyota Tundra Regular Cab V6 2WD Short Bed is named as the best deal for the Full-Size Pickup Truck 2WD 1/2 Ton class.

A common problem in programming is moving the program data to another spot, such as a file on disk or another computer. For example, suppose a video game needs to store a saved file on the hard drive. Normally, the developer would have to write a method that takes all the game information and puts it into a format that can be placed on disk. Another method needs to be written to reverse this. The concept of serialization, used in some programming languages, bypasses this.

If a language has serialization libraries, this means that these functions are built in. You can input an object and have built-in language libraries convert the object to data. And of course, you can do the reverse. Instead of having to write code and create your own format for storing program information, you can just have the language do it. This has a wide variety of uses besides the video game save file mentioned in the intro. Suppose you want any program to store user-inputted data. You can simply put that data into a serializable object, that write it to disk. When the program starts up again, use the deserialization methods.

This can also be used for network communications. Consider the problem of writing client and server programs that can communicate with each other. Instead of having to process data, you can just serialize the object and transmit its data over the network. As long as the client and server know what class is being used, this works.

However, not all programming languages can be serialized. Generally, this is only a feature of higher-level languages. .NET has it with the Serializable attribute for a class. For Java, the java.io.Serializable interface is used. Classes that implement this interface can be serialized. Even low-level languages such as C++ have the ability, albeit not in the standard library. The popular Boost C++ library has functions that provide the serialization ability.

However, there are also problems caused by serialization. Many languages do not have backwards compatibility. So if you write a new version of the program and try to use it with existing serialized data, it can fail. Fortunately, some languages do have backwards compatibility features that avoid this drawback.

Serialization is a useful tool that all programmers should know about. It provides an easy way to store program data permanently and transmit it between multiple computers. For languages where serialization libraries are built-in, this is generally very easy.